Smoking pot can still get you fired in Colorado

It may now be legal to smoke pot in Colorado, but employees can still be fired for doing so, even on their own time and in private.

You can walk into a store in Colorado and legally buy marijuana, but you might get fired if you smoke it.

A new Colorado state law went into effect January 1, permitting anyone 21 years of age or older to buy and consume limited amounts of marijuana in the state, despite the fact that marijuana is a controlled substance on the federal level.

If a company has a drug policy in place, and an employee fails a drug test, "employers can take whatever action they deem to be prudent," says Curtis Graves, an attorney for the Mountain States Employers Council, a nonprofit that represents about 3,000 companies, many of those in Colorado.

Employees can even be fired for using medical marijuana with a doctor's prescription.